Two Vignettes
by northernexposure
Summary: Two scenes between Alex and Gene, from Gene's POV. They don't really go anywhere, they were just... lurking.


Two Vignettes

Author's note: These scenes have been floating around my head for ages. They don't really lead anywhere...

xXx

Gene Hunt swirled the Dalmore around his glass before downing it in one gulp.

"You know what, Bols?" he said, through the comforting burn as the liquid hit his throat. "Sometimes I think your only purpose in this life is to torment me."

He watched as she stuck her thumbs the her back pockets of her jeans and cocked her head to one side. Today's eyeshadow was peacock blue. It made her eyes startlingly green. Gene looked away, reaching for the bottle again as she spoke.

"Actually, guv, I think it may be the other way around."

"Eh?"

"Never mind. Either way, you can't say I wasn't right. It was a front, and she was being used as cover. I dug a little deeper than you were prepared to bother with, and just look what it gave you. Biggest drugs bust of the decade. Not even you can tear me a strip for that one. If it wasn't for me you'd have banged up some poor woman already as much a prisoner as a criminal."

Gene knocked back his second whisky. It barely touched the sides. "Yeah, yeah. We're all very grateful for your womanly bouts of wisdom, Bolly," he spat, "but that doesn't change the fact that you once again hung your arse out there without even letting me know where you were going." He slammed the glass down on his desk, anger suddenly bubbling over. "To my mind, that is not good policing. You are not one of the Famous Five, you are a D.I in the MET - _my_ bloody D.I, and you don't investigate on your own. _Capice_?"

She narrowed her eyes. "Sorry, guv."

"Why do I get the feeling you don't mean that?"

Alex shrugged, unabashed. "Maybe some of my womanly intuition is rubbing off."

He eyed her, but decided not to voice the comment that crossed his mind. Sighing, Hunt dropped into his chair. "You know what your problem is, D.I Drake?"

"If you say something about me needing a good seeing to–"

"Discipline. Or rather, the complete and utter lack of it."

She laughed in that slightly wild way she had. "_You're_ telling _me_ that I have a lack of discipline? God, that's rich."

"It's true. You're a good bloody copper, Drake, but you have no discipline. You totter off and do what you like, and to hell with the consequences. One day, you're going to come a cropper. And I might not be there to save you."

Alex glared at him, a faintly amused expression playing across her face. He looked away, haunted by the green of her eyes, and pulled another dram.

"Go on then," he said, roughly, tired of this constant war in his gut. Not even the whisky helped much any more. "Get out of here. It's home time."

xXx

She'd said she was scared most of the time. He wondered why. Sure, she sometimes acted like a lunatic, but scared wasn't an adjective he would have associated with her. Strong, was more like it. Frustrating, annoying, distracting, those were others. A bloody good copper, that too. He meant what he'd said.

Gene watched her now, sitting at the bar in Luigi's, pretending to listen to the little Italian's prattle while downing her third glass of wine. She drank too much, he'd noticed, but he'd never brought it up. He liked her when she was drunk. When she was drunk, Drake's disconcerting turn of phrase seemed less insane.

He remembered another night that she'd been sat at that bar. He'd found himself pulling up a stool to join her, just as he always did, despite his best intentions. She'd been in another strange mood then, one of the ones where he could see a deep, inexplicable melancholy in her eyes, accompanied by the same wild, daring spark that made her haunt his dreams. _'What do you do, Gene? What do you do? Go on... say it.' _And he nearly had. He'd nearly chased her up those stairs, and to hell with it. But he'd done the right thing.

Although, every now and then, in the darkest hours of the night, when he woke up from a dream so vivid he could still smell her on him, he wondered. He couldn't help it.

He took another mouthful of his beer and looked up to find her staring at him. Her eyes were clouded, whether by drink or by that same melancholy he couldn't tell. And he found himself standing, walking towards her, grabbing a stool and slotting himself in at her side, just as he always did.

"What's up, Bols?" Gene asked softly, the fabric of his shirt brushing against her bare arm.

She shook her head vigorously, curls bobbing into his face. He could smell her perfume.

"Come on," he ordered, the familiar arousal making him curt, "you can't sit there with a face like a slapped arse and insist there's nothing wrong. That's what other women do. You're better than that. Crazier. But still better."

She rested her chin in her hand and looked up at him. "I want to go home," she said softly. "I just want to go home, Gene. I just want to go home."

She sounded so plaintive that he had to stop himself putting an arm around her shoulders. He didn't do that, not ever. But he thought he'd be willing to, for her.

"Well, that's easily fixed, Bols," he said instead. "Take yourself off upstairs and get an early night. I think you need one."

She looked away. "You don't understand," she said, "you'll never understand."

Irritation flared between his shoulderblades. No, he didn't understand her. Gene doubted he ever would, with all this nonsensical talk of home and a little girl so mysteriously absent. Not for the first time, Hunt wondered if he should run her name, see what all this chat about her apparently shadowy past added up to. After the recent revelations about Chris, he didn't know who he could trust any more.

But he wanted to trust her. He _wanted_ to.

Alex reached for her wine again, but he put his hand over hers, forcing her to return it to the table.

"You've had enough," he told her firmly. "I wasn't joking when I said you needed an early night. Come on, Bolly. Get your coat."

[END. POSSIBLY!]


End file.
